Pounding the Pavement

I am a big believer in logging my runs.  I've done it since I started training for my first marathon.  And I track on paper, so I can pull out my file and flip through past schedules and past seasons.  I love being able to look back and see how many miles I ran, and sometimes compare my times year to year on the same route/course.  It's also interesting to see my list of what my current nagging pain is (none right now, knock on wood!) and how it relates to mileage.  I used to log things like what I ate the day before, what I ate before the run, what I wore, etc., but now I've got that down to a science pretty much.  So my log mostly now is miles and time, with notes sometimes for temp, route and/or pains. 

My running week starts on Sundays with the long run.  And on Mondays, I usually total things up for the prior week. 

So I was shocked to see what the sum was for last week.  46.9.  With no extenuating circumstances.  Just 46.9 miles of running.  Plus there was some boot camp cardio and weights in there.  And a walk with my neighbor. 

I never hit that much in a week last year.   Last year, my biggest week was 46.1 miles, but it was the week before the Fourth of July, so there was a long run on Sunday and one the following Saturday, and the following week had no long run and was very low mileage.  So averaging out those 2 weeks, my mileage was in the mid-30s.  And it was still less than I did last week. 

In 2009, technically I logged 47.7 miles in one week (less than 1 more mile than this past week), but it doesn't really count.  It was marathon week and it was a Saturday marathon (St. George) (so 15k on Sunday, 1 on Mon, 7 on Tues, 4.2 on Wed, then off Thurs and Fri, then 26.2 on Sat).  And that week of 47.7 was followed by a major recovery week with very low miles (St. George is a beating on the recovery end). 

Back in 2008, I exceeded last week twice.  One week was 53.3 miles, but with extenuating circumstances (long run Sunday and then the following Saturday b/c of some conflicting plans on Sunday, and the following week was very low mileage) (the two weeks averaged out in the low 40s).  And one week was 47.1 miles (only .2 more than last week) and completely legit (long run of 21, rest day, 6.5 on Tues, rest day, 9.3 on Thurs, 1 on Fri, and 15k on Sat at an easy pace).  And that week was followed by a week in the low 30s. 

The big difference with last week is that I'm still more than 2 months away from race day.  In the past, when I've been around 45 miles in a week (w/o having 2 long runs in the same week), it's always been close to race day. 

This week, our schedule is I think about 48 miles.  I'm actually afraid to look and confirm exactly what the projected miles will be.  That means I'm going to have two weeks averaging out in the mid-40s. 

Oh my.  Hold on, this might be a wild ride...